Culturally responsive leadership for pandemic STEMgagement in computer science: A PK12 case study

This is part of our series "Faculty Research: Short and sweet," where College of Education faculty share their latest work.

Faculty member:

Dr. Devery Rodgers, Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership

Research-at-a-glance:

  • Through the lens of the Online Learning Framework (Redmond et al., 2018), this study highlights how STEM+C (science, technology, engineering, math and computer science) activities can bolster student engagement when engaged in virtual instruction.
  • While it is important for students to have hands-on practice for STEM connections (Struyf et al., 2019), some of these practices might be fostered online to create and foster STEM identities amongst more students.
  • This study enlightens the impact of technology leadership on the factors affecting computer science student engagement (Chang et al., 2024; Gurer et al., 2019; Willie et al., 2016), especially around how to keep students engaged socially, cognitively, behaviorally, collaboratively, and emotionally.
  • In this post-pandemic hybrid world of PK12 education, the onus is still on education leaders to close achievement gaps through equitable means. There are current socioeconomic, racial, gender, and geographical disparities that limit students鈥 full access to computer science education.

Summary:

This case study reports how one urban PK12 school district in the United States is addressing the 鈥渓eaky pipeline鈥 with sustainable solutions for computer science education with minoritized students. Using an online engagement framework, document review was used with narrative anthropology to conduct a content analysis of projects, programs, and services set up through the central office for nearly 20,000 students at the primary and middle grades, and secondary levels, in computer sciences.

Findings acknowledge leadership鈥檚 planning for student engagement in STEM+C for virtual instruction.

This study contributes to the burgeoning knowledge of leadership for computer science activities in PK12 and serves as a beacon for learning organizations bolstering computer science activities in the future.

Leadership for technology initiatives must be practiced to understand how to implement the research proving that STEM+C activities motivate students (International Society for Technology Education, 2024b).


How to practically apply this research:

In-person STEM+C activities can be flipped to virtual activities, as needed.

Citation:

Rodgers, D. J. (2025). Technology Leadership for Pandemic STEMgagement in Computer Science: A PK12 Case Study. Education Sciences, 15(1), 34.